Chapter 15 – Hunting around.

A sun has risen and a new day has come.

I couldn't find any safe spots, even after going through the night, so my goal today is to find at least 1 safe spot today and 1 or more tomorrow.

Honestly, I need to bit picky with the hiding location I chose, since I want to train my magic when I would be resting.

Right now, my growth got a mayor slow down after evolving and I obviously not be able to evolve for some time.

So currently one of the best means of me getting stronger is to learn magic and level up my skills.

Anyway, I also decided to do little hunting as well, since I still don't know what kind of monsters lives in this area and how strong they are.

If the monsters in this area are nowhere near my level, I should considering moving again.

However, I changed my mind.

True. I have strong body and all, but I need to strengthen my skills and learn magic.

But I have no idea about what could be lurking into the deeper parts of the forest. I don't know what I may encounter if I were to go even deeper.

What if I were to run into a monster that can both fly and possess a range attack? I maybe gotten stronger, but something like that would be my hard counter if not just straight up beat me up one sidedly.

Right now, I need to focus on improving my skills and learning magic rather than hunting.

And to train my magic in peace, I need a specific hiding spot that I can use.

But of course, hunting comes first now, since I have yet to find out how strong the monsters.

The first new monster I came across was: Would you guess it?

A goblin.

A short human monster with long lose and ears alongside a green skin.

Another iconic isekai monster.

Anyway, it didn't look strong or anything and it was just wearing rags to cover its private parts.

However, it was carrying a club.

By the look of things, these guys can use weapons.

Anyway, I leaped at that goblin and bit into its neck, killing its instantly.

That was…. Bit too easy? It was way easier when I was fighting the grey wolfs.

Well, maybe it was easy because it didn't had any proper equipment? It only had a rags and a club.

However, I think I would have harder time if it had some proper armor and weapons.

Goblins are usually seen as thief in fantasies that stole stuff from the people in order to arm themselves, so it wouldn't surprise me if they stole an equipment from the dead human and used it themselves.

On top of that, I should expect these goblins to have some intelligent, if they are able to use weapons.

Can they work together?

Can they set traps?

Can they strategize?

I shouldn't look down on them so much until I found more about them.

Anyway, the next monster I encounter was dodo.

…

No.

I'm really serious.

It was a mother fuking dodo bird!

Well, that dodo bird did had some sort of unicorn like horn sticking out from its head.

Honestly, I was expecting something like a magic coming from that horn or something, but nope.

This bird was just plain up stronger than a wolf in all different things like speed, endurance and strength. But it was quite dumb and I mean like very dumb.

That was…. Really weird?

Why did that dodo even had a horn in the first place when it wasn't even using it to stab me with it or something?

…

Yea… At least its meat tasted good, so I'm not complaining.

The next thing I encounter was a human.

I recognized that guy. He was that armor wearing adventure that I spotted before when I was hunting for humans.

Anyway, I was kind of curios about something.

He didn't seem to notice me, so I began slowly fallowing him without letting him know that he is being tailed.

The reason why I'm fallowing him is to see his strength. I want to see how powerful the humans that hunt here are.

After fallowing that man around, I saw him encounter some group of goblins.

The man weapon was a shield and mace.

His enemies were a group of 5 goblins.

3 had poor equipment like the one I encounter before, but the two in the back a knifes. I think they stole this knifes or something.

Anyway, the goblins began running towards the man, but he just swinged his mace around and killed one of them instantly.

Two goblins tried attacking him, but his armor did the trick and he took no real damage.

The man just pushed away the goblins with his shield, knocking them to ground before then smacking one of them with his mace and killing them.

There was really no need to describe the rest of the fight. Pretty much, he crushed every single goblin with his mace.

This guy was bit slow, probably because of his equipment, but I got to say, he did got some strength since he swinged once and goblin died.

After he killed all of the goblins, he took out a knife and began cutting the goblins left ears as well as picking up the daggers that two goblins were using, before then leaving. I guess the ears are something are a proof of subjugation and he took those knifes since they had value?

(…)

(Hm… Interesting. Is he heading towards the deeper parts of the forest?)

(I want to fallow him bit more and confirm if this is the case, but let's not do that. I have a lot to do and observing one person won't tell me the average strength of the humans hunting in this part of the forest.)

Anyway, I continue looking around for a monsters and hide out I could use.

Looking for the safe place in here maybe more challenging than I though.

Some safe spots I found ended up being a hangout spot used by some monsters.

I could get rid off them, but what would happened if I were to sleep in their place and their relative would came and attack me?

Nope. Bad idea.

I need to find a spot that isn't claimed by anybody or do not belong to the group of monsters.

On top of that, the spot needs to be hidden if I want to rest in peace and develop my magic.

Before I used a holes to hide myself, but now I've became too big to fit into any of those small holes that I used before.

Finding a spot for the current me will be hard, since not only I'm a freaking bigger than before, but I'm also alone. That means nobody will watch my back while I would be sleeping.

Honestly, it would be a nice thing if I had that ability to produce seeds like my parent. If I had that I could make myself my own children that would act as my soldiers.

The only safe spot I could find where I could take a nap would be a tall tree, but obviously it's a bad place for practicing magic, since there would be no room.

Fuck me. I guess I have no choice but to practice magic while walking around. But that would obviously be bit risky.

True. I have my mana detection. But what would happened if I had to focus and ended up forgetting maintaining the detection? I already got fucked once when I let got and turned off the detection.

There is also an option that I should take over a "Home" that one of these monsters are using. For example, I would stalk the goblins and find their home before then killing all of them and taking it over.

However, after thinking about it, I realized it was a stupid idea. A VERY STUPID IDEA.

Reason? It would make their absence noticeable.

"Hey. Why we couldn't find any goblins?"

"Weird. Nobody has seen goblins for some time."

"Wait. What if something killed them all? What if a monster was able to kill them all by itself?"

"Maybe we should launch an investigation to find out?"

Yeb. Bad idea.

It's for the best if I don't make that kind of mess at all cost.

Tch. Man…. This is annoying.

I guess finding a proper rest spot that meets all conditions would be physically impossible.

I guess I have to give up on it and stick with the trees.

However, I still want to find some quiet spot. A spot where I can train in peace my magic, even for a little bit without any monsters or humans interference.

But that would be obviously a pipe dream as well.

I mean, where would I find that kind of place? Outside the forest? But if I were to run outside the forest, wouldn't I run into a settlement or get spotted by humans? Fuck that!

By the look of things, I have no option left but to train in terrain filled with monsters.

Anyway, I already wasted enough time today. I guess it's time to practice magic finally.

I didn't encounter any real trouble while practicing magic like monsters or humans, but magic itself was very difficult for me to understand.

I…

Hm… Yeb. It's hard to describe it. Magic is literally something to me that never existed in my previous world, so obviously its bit confusing using it.

So, let's just say that understanding and feeling magic and using spells are difficult process.

By the look of things, it will take a loooooooong time before I can really do a single basic spell.

Anyway, rest of the day was boring and there was no need to describe the situation.

The night came, I climbed the giant tree and went to sleep.

The next day was a repeat from yesterday.

Looking around.

Hunting monsters.

Training magic.

However, I did spot some humans hunting in this area today.

I observed them and found out that they were better than the humans from the previous hunting grounds.

They knew how to handle weapons way better and how to fight better as well. They were just straight up stronger than the guys I encounter in the previous part of the forest.

However, they didn't appear to be stronger than that guy from yesterday. I guess he must have really been a higher ranking adventurer or something.

But that wasn't the end.

I saw an adventurer that was using water magic.

That was interesting! I thought that if I were to observe him, I would maybe get a hint on how to use magic.

However, I did not learned anything.

I mean I literally learned zero from observing him all the time he was using magic. I even used mana detection but it didn't gave me any results.

I guess observing magic in action while I have 0 knowledge about this is just straight up waste of time.

By the look of things, I really have to learn everything by myself, even the basic that I don't know about.

Great….

Anyway, I hunted some goblins, practiced magic bit more and made very little progress and went to sleep.

Another day has come and this time I saw something interesting.

While walking around, I ended up encountering a group of goblins.

However, the interesting thing about them was the goblin that was leading them.

It was much taller, it wasn't as tall as adult male or female human and its skin looked the same. But its size its noticeable different from other goblins.

(Hm… It doesn't look like an evolved version of the goblin. But instead something like their leader? Maybe a boss monster?)

(Either way, it has some leather armor and even has an axe.)

(Interesting. I wonder how much I would level up if I were to kill him?)